Call of Darkness
by Amity-Star
Summary: DG has discovered that her very existance was an accident. Because of her mother resurrecting her, the Queen set off something deep within her, something that threatens to engulf her Light in Darkness. With the Queen dying, can DG saw the Oz and herself?
1. Prologue: Snakeskin

**Disclaimer**: The only thing I own is a copy of Tin Man (finally!) that I got a JB-HiFi last weekend. Well, that and my plot, so no stealing or borrowing without asking. And if I copied someone else's idea, contact me and we can compare notes.

**Summery:** For two years DG has battled against politics, assassination attempts and a nightmare of a terrifying future. She is alone in an alien world not her own and jaded by events of her own making. Will she fall into the darkness that wants her so badly, or can she resist and become the saviour she was made out to be against the Witch?

**A/N**: This is my first Tin Man fic, so please, be gentle. The time-line of the fic is set two years after the Eclipse events which also takes into account some of the things that the Witch said in the cave to the girls. Pairings will come later. With that being said, this Prologue is trippy. So, without further ado…

**xXxXx**

**_Call of Darkness_**

**_Prologue: Snakeskin_**

**xXxXx**

Like a cobra ready to strike, she felt the cold tendril of power slither ever so slowly towards her, swaying like a metronome in the stillness that surrounded her. She could taste the fruit of bloodthirsty victory on her tongue as she breathed through her mouth, trying in vain to ignore the sharp smell of iron and copper in her nostrils.

The darkness enticed her.

All she had to do was reach out, allow the power to coil around her hand and feel the rush that was by birthright hers… it would have been as easy as breathing.

'_Just imagine all of those that oppose you, crumbling to their knees at your feet while you destroy their very lives!_' he hissed in her ear and she couldn't help but growl.

"And you can just imagine my answer." Came her whispered reply, turning her back to him and staring off into the pitch darkness that surrounded the two of them.

The coil – invisible to the naked eye but tangible to anything with magic in their veins – reared back, fury emanating from it as both it and the man behind her were rejected once more. She stood her ground nonetheless, bored of the Pretenders antics to try and sway her to do his bidding – to succumb to the Call of Darkness that had been reaching out to her ever since she had returned to the Outer Zone.

'_You will fail! Your Light is waning and just as the House of Gayle, it will perish!_' the Pretender roared. '_Mark my words, Dorothy-Gail, it is only a matter of time before the bonds to your Mother are severed, and when that happens, there will be no one in the entirety of the OZ to save you._'

DG turned to face him, matching his glare with one of her own. "For two years you have been telling me the same things, and for two years my answers have been the same. It started to irk me ages ago, but what really pisses me off is the fact that you wear the faces of all my friends and family… so why?" she ordered, wrapping her Light around herself to keep the Dark at bay. "Why do you settle on Cain's face more than the others when you know that I'll never accept? Either it's a stupid plan, or you are just really thick!"

The Pretender sneered at her, his face contorting so horribly that she barely recognised the clean-shaven face of Wyatt Cain. "Because I know how much of a temptation the Tin Man is for you."

A sarcastic grin worked itself to DG's face and she let out a short laugh. "As it goes, I wouldn't be joining you even if you held up a sign saying : 'come to the dark-side, we have cookies'!"

The Look-a-Like scowled, folding arms over his vest-covered chest. '_Even so, Dorothy-Gail, your freedom is coming to an end.'_ His black eyes – the only part of him that didn't look like Cain – bored deep into her soul. '_Mark these words, this illusion of peace and Light that you try so hard to reinforce are failing miserably. Every day my army's prison weakens as I grow stronger.'_

"Oh no!" she muttered sarcastically, "Time is running out! The apocalypse is coming and Timmy is stuck down the well." She was sick of his nightly diatribes.

The coil of darkness that DG had nearly forgotten about, wrapped around her neck suddenly, chocking her slowly regardless of the fact that her Light was still protecting her. Her blue eyes widened when she started to feel that light start to splutter and break, sending a spider-web of cracks through her magic. Shocks of darkness pierced her from between the holes in her shield. "How…?" she gasped, a silent scream stuck in her throat as her only protection snapped against the dark power of the Pretender.

'_As I told you before, I grow stronger with every day that passes. This is my good-bye present to you, Dorothy-Gail, let it remind you of the power that I could give you.'_ His cold, black eyes gleamed in satisfaction as DG finally screamed.

--

**xXxXx**

**--**

Blood dripped down her finger, a stark contrast to the white linen cloth that covered the table in front of her. The rose in her right hand was forgotten as she stared at the swelling droplets of crimson, memories that were both hers and yet not, surfacing to the forefront of her mind.

Shaking her head to dismiss the intrusive thoughts, Azkadellia frowned before bringing her finger up to her mouth and gently licking off the life-blood from her small wound.

The flower arrangement on the table in front of her was quickly forgotten in light of recent events that she was specially attuned to.

Lurline would never know until too late… _Or never at all_.

The flare of darkness had caught her unawares, thus resulting in her injury, but Azkadellia would rather have been injured, than be caught up in the familiar euphoria that the Darkness still created within her. After virtually growing up and thriving off of the dark powers of the Witch, she had – at first – felt bereft of the Witch's magic's, but quickly learnt to shun the feeling and turn her back on anything to do with the supernatural.

That included her family.

But to turn her back on this… she couldn't do that, especially when she knew the things that she did. Now that He had obviously found the key to his prison, Azkadellia had to come out of her hiding place and face the Darkness once again.

And that revelation made her want to cry.

If He was gaining power after two millennia of imprisonment… she shuddered to think. If Azkadellia were anything like her sister, she'd most likely huff and scream and throw something.

As it stood, Azkadellia was not her sister, but her own corrupted person that really wanted to break something…_ Or kill it._

"Oops," she mumbled darkly, dismissing her last thought and letting the rose in her hand fall to the ground. Wordlessly, she reached out with her injured hand and pushed the vase over. She watched as it fell and shattered into millions of crystalline pieces, indifferent to the mess she had made.

But she was satisfied by the destruction she had caused nonetheless.


	2. Chapter 1: Cause and Effect

**DISCLAIMER:** I don't own Tin Man. I do own the plot, so no stealy from me, okay?

Call of Darkness

Chapter 1: Cause and Effect

**x X x X x**

**x X x**

**x X x X x**

"DG, my darling, are you cold?"

Startled, she looked up, blinking at her mother before processing the question. Was she cold? In the physical sense, no. In the psychological sense? She had frostbite. But she wouldn't tell her mother – she had more than enough to deal with at the moment.

"Yes, mother. I felt a chill and wanted to stop it from becoming something more." She lied, securing the scarf further around her neck and trying not to wince when the material tightened around a rather painful bruise. She had put a glamour on the bruises, but the spell wouldn't work on her mother.

From her position on the bed, Lurline smiled warmly and patted the spot next to her. "I certainly hope you don't get sick. You are the only one to be able to represent the family tonight at the ball and –" she suddenly broke off to cough harshly, her face paling rapidly.

DG frowned, moving quickly to her mothers side and manifesting a glass of water in case Lurline needed it. As she patted her mothers back lightly, Lurline's cough suddenly turned wet and the pristine white handkerchief she held infront of her mouth blossomed with scarlet.

"Mother!" DG cried, her eyes widening at the sight of blood.

Lurline stopped coughing, her hands falling to her sides as she gasped wetly for breath. Her lavender eyes were dilated and glassy, a thin sheen of sweat coating her brow. "I'm fine… DG. I just… need… a minute." She whispered, leaning back into her pillows and closing her eyes.

"You're coughing up blood!" DG whispered harshly, a strange tingle running through her veins that seemed to echo distantly of malice. She ignored it, focusing on her sick mother. She took Lurline's hand and willed her Light to help…

Only to stare open-mouthed as her magic refused to help her mother.

"I am not letting you heal me, my angel." Lurline's voice was weak, but she was starting to take deeper breaths.

"Let me help!" was the only thing that DG could whimper as her gut tightened into knots; a foreboding feeling settled into her very core.

Lavender eyes opened, focusing on wide, scared blue ones. "I can't allow that, my DG. What I have, no one can help or fix."

Tears blurred DG's vision, her ears starting to burn.

"I'm dying."

And DG's entire world shattered.

**x X x X x**

For the first two months after the Eclipse, DG had settled into her new life slowly. In under a week, she had found out that her parents weren't her real parents, but robots – _nurture units_ – sent to protect her. She was really a Princess – the only hope to vanquish an evil Witch that she had inadvertently released into the world and possessed her beloved older sister (who had, in essence, died that same day).

So many things had happened to her in that one week than she could ever had hoped for in her entire lifetime.

But now she wished it was all just a bad dream.

She had been having nightmares frequently after the Eclipse – courtesy of the Pretender, she had found out later – and they only got worse after she found out her family's secret. The family curse.

Of course, her mother was blissfully unaware that DG knew, and DG was willing to keep it that way for a long time to come. Whether it was from the illness that had slowly drained Lurline of her energy or her forced ignorance on the issue, she failed to noticed the sparkle in DG's blue eyes start to fade.

In those two months after the Eclipse, DG's life was slowly but surely cemented into the Oz and her ties with Kansas – with the Other Side – were severed entirely. When she had realised this, she had cried and apologised to Cain who had witnessed her little breakdown. She also realised that her three new-found friends had previous lives that they had to get back to.

The first of the group to leave was Raw, leaving to return to his people two-and-a-half-months after the Eclipse, saying goodbye quietly to everyone but not before becoming the Ambassador for Viewers to the Queen.

Azkedellia had locked herself in her room after that.

Cain was the next to go, accepting a posting as Captain of the newly reinstated Tin Man service in Central City a month after Raw left. It had been a teary goodbye, but the promise that he had given her was still kept until that day. They both saw each other whenever their obligations weren't in the way, which was sadly once every three months or so.

And then it was Glitch's turn to leave not only her, but the Oz for good. Not four weeks after Cain left the Winter Palace, the medic-alchemists reinserted Glitch's brain and he returned to being Ambrose, the stuffy adviser to the Queen who decided to retire and go travelling around the Oz.

Although she received letters from all her friends (even Ambrose, surprisingly) she still missed them terribly. They had helped her through such a trying time in her life and to have them suddenly not there…

She needed them back.

For two years of political backstabbing from remaining members of the Court, princess lessons, etiquette and whatever other lessons that Tutor came up with, she had suffered through them all without too much complaint. She took whatever he gave to her in stride – as just punishment, really, for her actions that had plunged the Oz into despair.

But what she had just heard was the icing on the cake.

**x X x X x**

She stumbled from the room, ignoring her mother's hoarse yells and shaking off the offered arm of one of the guards. She straightened herself up and continued down the hall towards the stairs. Bile rose in her throat and she forced herself to swallow it down.

As DG made her way down the stairs, she realised that she had never felt this conflicted when she had been travelling for the Emerald.

Everything was just too new for her to analyse things properly, and afterwards she was in too much shock and coming off of a week-long adrenalin high to let anything really sink in.

Now all she felt was a void within herself, a yawning, empty chasm that sucked at her Light like some kind of black hole.

On autopilot, DG turned down a random corridor, her mind whirring and numbing with the news that she had just been given.

Her mother, the Queen of the Oz, was dying from a mysterious illness that the healers had no clue to its origin.

But DG did.

Lurline would have already been dead if she hadn't have been imprisoned in Azkedellia's magical fortress.

Lurline would not be dying with such indignity if not for DG.

**x X x X x**

_"A Gayle woman cannot survive without magic, DG. It is their essence; the life blood in their veins. For a Gayle Queen, however, it is slightly different." Tutor's voice resonated in the vast expanse of the library._

"_I don't understand, Toto." DG asked, a furrow appearing between her eyebrows. "I was able to live without my magic back in Kansas."_

_Tutor growled at the pet name she had used, but let it slip nonetheless. "Yes, you did. But you still had your magic, it was only hidden from you – you subconsciously knew that it was there but forgot how to access it."_

"_Oh." DG replied slowly, furrow deepening. "Then how can you do that?"_

_It was Tutor's turn to look puzzled. "I'm not sure what you mean, DG. Do what?"_

"_Strip them of their magic? How is it different for a Queen?" she stated, eyes downcast as she twiddled with the lid of the gold pen in her hands. There were dark circles under DG's blue eyes – a testament to the beginning of her nightmare with the Pretender._

_Tutor shifted slightly, uncomfortable with the first question. "Erm, for a Gayle woman to lose all her magic is by facing an opponent of the same magical level or greater. They can also freely give all of their power to someone who has just recently touched Death's Veil."_

_Looking up, understanding shone in her eyes. " You mean someone like me." It wasn't a question, but Tutor nodded anyway. "But mother is still alive after she gave her magic to bring me back."_

"_Well, a Queen's magic is different. For a Gayle Woman, magic is their essence. For a Queen, that essence turns to a Life-Bond with the Oz. Their magic multiplies exponentially but it's tied to the well-being of the Land. This Bond produces Natural Magic which sustains many of the creatures that live in the Oz."_

_DG frowned, chewing on the end of her gold pen. "But I thought Life-Bonds were only meant to be between a man and a woman who've found their soul-mate. How can a Queen have two Life-Bonds?"_

_Tutor chuckled. "The secret's have been lost to the Ancients, but there are theories that state that the Queen has to have a bond with Land that she is to govern to rule fairly and justly. It was Ozma that decreed this, supposedly, but very little text has survived throughout the centuries." He sighed. "Pretty much, one cannot exist without the other."_

_A sinking feeling began in her stomach and DG ignored the tiny dark emotion that awoke in the darkest corner of her heart. "But that doesn't explain how my mother is still alive."_

_Tutor ran a hand over his face and he moved to stand near the window. He was silent for several minutes before he turned to her slightly. "The Queen gave you her magic to come back from the Veil, and she did not die like others in the past. But the Oz started to wither and blacken not days after your resurrection almost as if she had._

"_It is a theory of mine that when the Queen brought you back, she gave up her right to be Queen in exchange for your life." He smiled wanly, moving back over to his chair at the opposite end of the table and sat down. "It's just a theory like I said, but there are still many loose-ends to tie up."_

_But if it was just a theory, then why did her heart feel like it had been ripped out of her chest and crushed infront of her face?_

**x X x X x**

The mahogany bathroom door crashed open with a wave of her magic and shut behind her just seconds before she vomited up her breakfast.

As the contents of her stomach floated to the bottom of the porcelain bowl, she leaned her head against the tile wall and closed her eyes.

Lurline was dying because she had given her magic to bring DG back from the grave. She wasn't dying because she had severed her ties as a Queen.

No one knew the real reason why she was dying except for DG because it was all her fault.

Or more precisely, it was because of what Lurline had unlocked within DG that was killing her.

It was the freed Darkness within DG that was killing Queen Lurline of the Outer Zone.

And all because Dorothy-Gale, second-born daughter of Queen Lurline and Prince Consort Ahamo _**was never meant to exist at all**_.

**x X x X x**

The sudden shift in her little sisters Light roused Azkedellia from her nap. She sat up against the plush cushions on her day-bed, moving the open book off of her chest and onto the small side table.

A small emotion flitted across her cold heart. Pity, perhaps? She shrugged, closing her eyes and focusing on her sisters magic. A frown marred her features when she realised how close the darkness was to the surface.

"Don't let him win, little sister." She said to the empty air sternly. "You have the power to reawaken the Oz. Don't screw it up again; I don't want to be dragged into your mess."

In the distance, Azkedellia felt an ancient force stir and the tiniest inkling of fear crept down her spine.

If **he** were to awaken, it would make the reign of the Witch look like nothing more than a toddler during play-time.


	3. Chapter 2: The Edge of the Abyss

**Call of Darkness**

**X**

**X**

**X**

Chapter 2: The Edge of the Abyss

**X**

**X**

**X**

The room was spinning out of control, colours blurring together to coalesce into one large rainbow of colours that dazzled her, numbing her mind further. Pearls and diamonds sparkled from the lights in the chandeliers, whilst silks, satins and furs brushed against her bare arms as she swirled around the ballroom floor in the arms of yet another nameless man. (Or rather, she couldn't be bothered trying to remember his name. They were all the same, if she thought about it – all looking past what made her what she was as a person and slobbering over her title.)

The ball unfolded around her, all the gentry and nobles and ambassadors from various foreign countries smiling their fake smiles and pretending to accept her as their future sovereign. Expensive perfumes clogged and muddled her senses as nameless faces replaced those of others watching her.

Music – once lively (and what she would have classified as 'classical') – stopped, and she felt rather than saw the nobleman that she had danced with before bow infront of her. She tried to smile – but she couldn't. It she smiled, she felt as though her carefully constructed mask would crack wide open for all the court to see.

Her carefully ordered, strictly structured world had all but fallen down around her head, her too fragile heart crumbling to ash in her chest in the wake of her day. The wounds were far too new and open; her magic clamouring inside of her to do _something_ to make at least make the pain go away.

Another nameless, faceless man swept her into a complicated waltz, her body being manipulated and twisted to suit her dance-partners needs and wishes. She was pliant, a marionette to be used and possessed.

'_Just like the Witch._'

The dark echo snapped DG out of her thoughts, a startled gasp leaving her throat.

She stumbled. Her eyes were too large for her face, her blood leaving her head and making her feel faint. People stared at her as her partner swept her around the ballroom, oblivious to her distress. The whispers were already making a circuit of the room, intrigued women twittering to one another behind their fans while men stared openly at her, as if daring her to say something in her defence.

She forced her feet to stop moving.

Her partner frowned, still holding onto her hand and waist. "Is something the matter, Your Highness?" he asked disappointment and annoyance flashing in his green eyes.

Her nod was stiff, mechanical. Pulling her hands and body from his grasp, she curtsied, saying nothing and she turned, disappearing into the throng of dancers, lace, cotton and velvet swallowed her whole.

**_OZ_**

- _**OZ - oz - OZ - oz - OZ -**_

**_OZ_**

"How _**dare**_ you!" she hissed between clenched teeth. She glided like a shadow through the dark, empty garden, glaring heatedly at the still water of the pond in the middle of her temporary sanctuary.

Moonlight danced off the surface of the pond. It appeared glass-like, perfect and smooth, until the slightest shift at the edges of the pond spread like ink over the silver of the reflected moon until only complete darkness mirrored her image back to her – showing her someone that she was not.

Instead of her broken and sad blue eyes, gazing back at her with a kind of fearsome nonchalance were the eyes of a woman who had turned heartbreak into anger. They blazed darkly, simmering with power that she, herself was far too afraid to tap into and use. Her skin was white, almost frighteningly so against the bright emerald of her dress. Although her reflection showed her skin to be equally pale, the dress that she stared at was a deep, blood red, which blurred to black at the edges.

'_Come now, Dorothy-Gale,'_ her mirrored image said, her mouth moving into a sneer. A large ripple distorted the image, centring from its mouth with every word it spoke. '_You of all people know it to be the truth.'_

DG whirled around, throwing her hands up into the air in her anger and frustration. "Don't you think I know that!" she exploded, magic flaring and curling around her. Dark violet flashed, sparked against her fingertips and with a twist of her hand, her magic expanded outwards, encompassing her and the pond in a silencing bubble. She watched the wall of the bubble sparkle like millions of tiny violet coloured stars around her.

The more she used her magic, her mother's unknown seal weakened and her true magic was released, one that she desperately wished didn't deteriorate at such a rapid rate. She could feel it, now that she was aware of it, a seal of pure white, slowly being corrupted and eaten away like her magic was a cancer, consuming all the light within her and leaving behind the darkness that would not only destroy the Oz, but her as well.

Even now, she could feel the dark, insidious coils of her forbidden power.

'_There is nothing you can do to stop it, Dorothy-Gale_'. The woman stared back at her, a smirk contorting the features that DG both knew and yet didn't.

Despair threatened to drown her then, an internal struggle against the effects the darkness' words were having on her. He emotional walls, what was left of them, crumbled entirely then, her words echoing in her lead, hollow heart. "I know that too." She whispered, turning her face away and slumping in on herself, defeat tangible in the air around her.

'_Then why do you insist on fighting me?!_'

Magic similar to her own flared to life in the pond, her reflections eyes blazing red. Its hair was whipping wildly about its head, almost like it was in the middle of a storm. The magic was dark, malevolently so, and hungry – but a phantom of the power that was being broadcast by the being responsible for the illusion in the pond. Ancient spells created annuals past enabled the dark magic and energies to be kept safely out of the Royal Palace.

DG could feel them tingle against her skin every time she accessed her own magic. Which begged the question: how much longer could she stay in the Palace without raising suspicion?

The water stirred, whipped up furiously by the owner of the dark magic's anger, but still the ancient spells held.

DG stood motionlessly, her violet magic still pulsing around her as she regarded the blurred and barely discernible shape in the blackness of the ponds tempest-like surface. "I released the Witch when I was six annuals old and plunged the Oz into fifteen annuals worth of darkness and despair. I now know that my very existents is a freak accident – something that the Ancients strove to keep from ever happening again." Her stormy blue eyes suddenly bled to black as her careful consideration turned into contempt. "_**I**_ am the reason why the Oz is dying! _**I**_ am the darkness! _**I**_ am the very embodiment of evil and for those facts alone – I will never release you from your prison!" she screamed, throwing both her arms out infront of her. Dark violet magic erupted from her entire body, lighting up the area around her, spreading outwards in a dizzying rush that roared deafeningly in her ears in an explosion that rocked the ground around the Palace and completely obliterated the garden that she stood in.

When she opened her eyes, she found herself in a crater of what used to be the garden, panicked screams filtering through the heavy dust coming from the ballroom.

Her heart was racing in her chest, whether from adrenalin, panic, fear, elation – she wasn't sure. But one look at the sparks that still danced around her body made her cringe and whimper.

Dark blue sparks crackled along the ground at her feet, her breath coming in gasps, her chest tightening to the point of pain.

Armour-clad footsteps pounded on the pavement near the entrance of the garden, and DG reacted without thought.

By the time the contingent of guards rounded the corner, DG was gone, teleporting herself far away from the scene of the crime.

"Guests say that the Princess was in the garden!" one guard cried, eyes wide at the destruction infront of him. His hand tightened subconsciously on his spear, as a cold chill lingered in the air.

A pair of cool, steely eyes narrowed. "She wasn't kidnapped." He replied, watching the younger man.

The guard bristled, almost aching to run into the garden to prove the older man wrong. "No offence, sir, but how would you know?"

The man gave the youth a calculated grin. "'Cause I know the Princess better than she knows herself."

There was a snort from behind them. "Princess was here. Angry, very angry." The contingent of guards parted to allow the Viewer to walk passed them and into the charred remains of the garden. "DG not want to be found." He added, slightly affronted.

Cain nodded, pulling at the starched collar of his dress-shirt. "We go to all the trouble to be here tonight, and then she up and disappears." He mumbled, moving to stand next to Raw. The guards grumbled behind him, moving to check the garden, just in case.

"Something bothering DG. Something different. Makes her scared, angry… hurt." Raw frowned, scenting the air. "Feels powerless against change that she cannot stop."

Cain stared at him. "You can tell that by just standing here?" he asked. He knew that Raw was powerful compared to normal Viewer standards, but this was different.

"DG's magic very strong, very powerful. But different, changed."

"Different, how?"

Raw stood in silence before bending down in the exact spot that DG had been standing in not minutes earlier. He placed both his hands palm-down in the charred dirt, closing his eyes to concentrate. He whimpered, whether from pain, or fear, Cain couldn't tell, but he watched as Raw wrenched his hands away from the dirt, as if he had been burnt, and struggled to stand up.

Cain helped him, reaching over to pull him up by one arm, and was shocked to find his furry friend shaking from head to toe. "Raw? What is it?" he asked, his mouth going dry at the sheer terror that shone at him from Raw's tawny eyes.

"DG…" Raw started, tears welling up in his eyes, hopelessness making him drown in his emotions. "Magic is dark, like the Witch!" he finally managed to hiss.

Cain reeled back and away from him, shaking his head. After what they had all gone through, he didn't believe what Raw was saying about DG. He refused to believe it.

Because if something was happening to DG than not even she could stop, then there was nothing that anyone could do to save the Oz.

**_OZ_**

- _**OZ - oz - OZ - oz - OZ -**_

**_OZ_**

_"Once upon a midnight clear,_

_A Winter King with an evil leer._

_Out to conquer the worlds all known,_

_With a power so dark_

_And ready to be sown._

_But hark as the good Witch arises,_

_Battles so fierce, heaven trembled in the skies._

_When the Good Witch won out overall,_

_The Evil in exile to live out the fall._

_Until a time when the day is as night,_

_As two sisters regain a long-lost light,_

_And the Once Winter King returns to the land,_

_Ready to bring chaos and panic at hand._"

Her voice echoed in the dark room, eyes glazed as she remembered the nursery rhyme from her childhood. In her hands lay a headless doll, wearing a red dress – the twin to DG's own. Its head lay forgotten on the stone floor of her tower, face a macabre mask of normalcy from the single flickering candle that stood at her elbow on the table.

Azkadellia rocked herself back and forth in her chair, cold sweat dripping down her brow as the ever tempting Darkness reached out to her, grasping at her fragile mind and heart; dark talons clawing at the already tattered remains of her soul.

Her hold on reality was slipping by the day, barely bearable during the day – almost impossible during the night.

But it was her own fault – her self imposed exile that would only delay the inevitable.

With each hour that passed, DG's powers grew exponentially, the light dimming within her little sister and there was nothing that she could do.

"You must do it yourself, Deeg." She muttered to herself, sounding somewhat lucid. "You can defeat _him_! Don't let him win!"

A blistering cold wind blew from the north, making her shudder.

It would snow soon, right in the middle of high summer.

The Winter King's prison wouldn't hold him for long, the Ancient's spells weakening and degrading with the years.

"Not much longer little sister." She whispered cryptically, her eyes glazing over as she started humming a tune. _"Once upon a midnight clear, a Winter King with an evil leer…_"


End file.
